AMD unveil Mantle and EA/BF4 drops DirectX

The Joker

The Joker

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At AMD's GPU14 Tech Day event in Hawaii, alongside the brand new Radeon R9 290X GPU, the company has also unveiled a new development model called 'Mantle'. As a combination of both API specifications and GPU drivers, Mantle will allow developers to fully unlock the graphics potential of the GCN architecture of the new (and likely the previous) Radeon series, through low-level high-performance drivers.

Battlefield 4 will be the first title to use Mantle, with the technology coming through a free update in December. Mantle brings greater control of the GPU and CPU to game developers, especially in the memory department, which will allow games to harness the full potential of graphics cards. This model will be more similar to what is found on consoles, where developers have huge control over what hardware they use in their games.

While the technology is still in early stages, EA says it will allow PC game developers to harness even more graphics power than ever before. Where possible, Mantle will be used instead of DirectX 11 on compatible AMD hardware, although it's still compatible with other rendering APIs. AMD claims Mantle enables nine times more draw calls per second than other APIs, which is a huge increase in performance.

We've been told at the GPU14 Tech Day event that the Mantle API is open, so theoretically Nvidia could purpose the technology in their GPUs. It should also make cross-development between PC and console games a lot easier, and also more incredible for those with a high-performance AMD GPU.
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http://www.techspot.com/news/54134-amd-launches-mantle-api-to-optimize-pc-gpu-performance.html

This is pretty insane, I never thought anyone would drop DX lol
All in all really good news for us gamers though.
 
For the 1st time in history it'll finally benefit gamers to buy one gpu over another.
If this is the future I am all for it.
 
Looks like everyone is dropping DX, hell even Steam's Source 2 engine is said to be OpenGL based instead of DX.

Guess Microsoft's grip on gaming is finally coming to an end?
 
Very very interesting development. And seeing as how I have an AMD GPU, this is very compelling. :D
 
How will it fair with older AMD GPU's ?

Seeing as I have a HD5970, will the tech still be viable?
 
Does this mean we're going back to proprietary API's, or am I understanding this wrong? I hope that's not the case.
 
Eugene said:
Does this mean we're going back to proprietary API's, or am I understanding this wrong? I hope that's not the case.
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Well almost, at least they opened it up so iIts a "Use if you want" scenario so not as bad as the old days before DX.

We've been told at the GPU14 Tech Day event that the Mantle API is open, so theoretically Nvidia could purpose the technology in their GPUs.
Click to expand...
 
Ok I don't really understand. Will this apply to all AMD graphics cards? I buying a new card, pretty much for battlefield. so should I go for AMD?
 
The Joker said:
For the 1st time in history it'll finally benefit gamers to buy one gpu over another.
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3DFX and Glide says "Hi!" from the 90's :P If you're old enough to remember those days...

BeoTeK said:
How will it fair with older AMD GPU's ?

Seeing as I have a HD5970, will the tech still be viable?
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Mantle will only work with GCN-based graphics cards, so older cards will still be able to render the game using DirectX. As far as DICE has revealed, Mantle is currently equivalent to what they can do in DirectX 11.

Eugene said:
Does this mean we're going back to proprietary API's, or am I understanding this wrong? I hope that's not the case.
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Somewhat, yes. But we haven't had a strong option aside from DirectX and OpenGL for decades, and numerous game developers (Carmack being one of them) have complained before that DX is too weighed down with legacy code and Microsoft's restrictions. This is pretty much doing what Microsoft does for the Xbox One - strips away everything that isn't necessary and gives that to devs to work with.

Mantle should also make porting to Linux and OS X a little easier if it ever appears on those platforms. I like the idea of a consistent API across multiple platforms. Its definitely a stab at DirectX's monopoly.

Gir said:
Will this apply to all AMD graphics cards? I buying a new card, pretty much for battlefield. so should I go for AMD?
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Only cards from the HD7000 series and up. If you're playing Battlefield 4, yes, go for AMD. DICE is a hardware partner and you'll get a good experience right out of the box (mind you, the same is true for Nvidia). And if Mantle takes off and appears in all Frostbite games, you'll have the hardware to support it.
 
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Wesley said:
Only cards from the HD7000 series and up. If you're playing Battlefield 4, yes, go for AMD. DICE is a hardware partner and you'll get a good experience right out of the box (mind you, the same is true for Nvidia). And if Mantle takes off and appears in all Frostbite games, you'll have the hardware to support it.
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I am not a fan of where this is going...

Nvidia dropped or shall we say walked away from the console space due to lack of profits and joined the Steam camp, even gone so far as to give Valve access to Shield tech for streaming. All this in order to promote the Steam Bo^b^b Machines.

So we looking at a serious split in the next gen Games. Mantle for performance on ATI vs OpenGL + Nvidia for streaming capability using Nvidia cards.

Lets hope I am wrong.
 
AlphaJohn said:
I am not a fan of where this is going...

Nvidia dropped or shall we say walked away from the console space due to lack of profits and joined the Steam camp, even gone so far as to give Valve access to Shield tech for streaming. All this in order to promote the Steam Bo^b^b Machines.

So we looking at a serious split in the next gen Games. Mantle for performance on ATI vs OpenGL + Nvidia for streaming capability using Nvidia cards.

Lets hope I am wrong.
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I think we should let this play out.
With where Microsoft is taking DX lock downs to their new kernels this was inevitable.
What we dont want to see is NVidia come with a competitor. We want to see mantle becoming an open standard which is wishfull thinking.
Either way we are not going to be rid of it anytime soon so time to buckle down.
 
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